


Songbird

by LilyAngorian



Series: A Gangster Always Needs A Nurse [9]
Category: Peaky Blinders (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-10
Updated: 2017-09-10
Packaged: 2018-12-26 04:42:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12051552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LilyAngorian/pseuds/LilyAngorian
Summary: Stella and Tommy reflect on their circumstances and their future, and the action intensifies. Once again this was supposed to be a conclusion, but I'm not sure the end resolves much, so there may well be one final chapter to come. Promise it'll be final this time ;)





	Songbird

“Stella. Just look at me, please.”

She stared fixedly at the ceiling, as he blocked the open doorway, hands pressed against the wood on either side as he watched her.

“I know you’re angry, but I can’t make any of this go away now. You have to live with this until I’ve taken care of business, and then you’ll be free to do whatever you want.”

A bowl of soup lay untouched on the floor beside the bed, an empty whisky glass stood beside it. The room smelt stale, even though the cut flowers were fresh that morning, and the bed linen had been changed twice already in the week Stella had been there. When she had looked at the flowers, all Stella had thought about was what Ada had said across her kitchen table. Better in the ground, where they belong. They’d been taken from the dresser and left by the door, another silent protest. 

“I’d prefer it if you stay when you have the choice to leave, but it’s not my decision.”

She sighed softly, bringing a hand up to run across her brow, fingers running back through her hair as she finally replied.

“It’s your decision I’m here now, and who’s to say you’ll ever resolve whatever business it is? I could be here for months.”

“Not months, a week, two at the most. Things aren’t right at the moment, but they will be soon, I can promise you that.”

“Why should I believe you? I thought I could trust you, but then you do this to me. You’ve lost that faith.”

“I’ve lost all faith Stella. Haven’t you?”

“I’ve lost myself. I can’t work out at what point everything became so wildly out of my control."

“I never meant f-“

“It doesn’t matter what you meant. This is as much my fault as yours. I’ve said and done so much to my own detriment.”

“You regret everything?”

“I can’t work out how to divide the good from the bad.”

“But you love me?"

She sat up quickly, but didn’t meet his gaze, eyes flicking to the light streaming through the locked window. 

“I didn’t say it was rational. I’m aware it certainly isn’t one of my better decisions.”

“I know it’s one of mine.”

She gave no reaction, and so he pressed on.

“I can’t lose you Stella, and thanks to me your life is at risk outside these walls. This is the only way I can protect you.”

“But-“

“-I know you’d rather protect yourself, but you don’t understand these men Stella. They don’t care what you’ve done in France or the hospital, how much you’ve sacrificed, how much you deserve. You’ll just be another dead girl on the street.”

Her voice was coarser in reply, anger building.

“Don’t you think its time to stop putting people’s lives at risk? Don’t you want peace one day?”

“Peace doesn’t see my family fed or respected, not yet.”

“You know, the name Shelby means something in these streets Tommy. Whatever you’ve been running from…surely it’s far enough behind you now?”

“I don’t expect you to understand. I just ask you to trust me, now, if never again.”

“I trust that you’re doing what you to believe to be right. I trust that you feel the way you say you do, about me. I just wish we’d gone about this a different way.”

“Will you stay, when this is over?”

She shut her eyes, letting the anger pass slowly, before replying quietly

“If I’ve really the choice, I can’t promise I will.”

“I’m sorry Stella.”

“So am I. Both my work and you threatened to burn me up, but without either of you, I’ve nothing left. If I leave this house, I’ve no-one.”

He had nothing to say to that.

 

*****

He would come to her at night, slipping the key into the lock and easing the door free so quietly that she doubted a soul in the house would have heard him. Not that it mattered anyway, she may as well have been his songbird, his property. She slept very little in that room, legs restless and mind racing through her thoughts, and it was like he knew. The first few nights she had shunned him completely, furious at his decisions, torn apart by his confession. But as the tear between her heart and her head became more clear, the days left her bitter and closed, and the nights had her pouring herself over him. It was though she was two separate women, one of whom who would only show her face when it was too dark to be seen. 

She heard him click the lock of the door behind him, shedding his clothes as he walked to the bed. She felt him slide under the sheets beside her, bare chest radiating heat to her back.

“It’s colder tonight."

She felt him nod against the pillows, and she rolled over to face him. The light was delicate, slithers of pale moonlight falling from between the curtains, and he could have been a ghost.

“Are they still out there?”

“Arthur reckons he got rid of two earlier, but I don’t know how many are watching the place. I know they’ve been to the hospital though.”

“Did anyone get hurt?”

“They’re not that stupid. Don’t worry, if anything happens there, the police’ll take care of it.”

“They can’t just take care of everything now?”

“No. It’s not that kind of situation.”

Stella nodded gently, stroking the back of her hand down his arm, lower legs nudging against his.

“What did you do to them Tommy?”

She wasn’t afraid of the answer any more, though she didn’t know what that meant. Had her moral standards slipped, or had he convinced her of enough goodness to redeem him, even now?

“I chose to side against them. It was the right choice.”

“How can you be sure?”

“I value loyalty, and they’re not known for it. Sometimes you have to go against your instincts to settle business. But when it came down to it, they wanted to cut their own path. I wouldn’t have held that against them, but when it came to making my position clear, they only left the choice to kill or be killed.”

“Who was it?”

“The youngest of three brothers.”

“How young?”

“Always too young Stella. But old enough to hold a gun to my head.”

She moved her hand down to his chest, stroking the familiar scars, soaking her skin in the heat.

“It always used to seem so easy, when I was a child. There were the police, and there were villains. There were the soldiers, and there were enemies. There were strong people and weak people.”

“I’d take that above real life. But it would make me a villain.”

“Rightfully. But you’re a good man as well, whatever that means.”

When she kissed him, she cast off the last heavy traces of the daytime. Her restless limbs wrapped and curled around him, her skin aflame and breathing erratic. He echoed her with a quiet understanding, every moment an apology. The last lingering thought in her mind was that he was right, she was still vulnerable. He just didn’t realise that he was as much of a danger to her than any young men paid to kill. 

 

*****

It had been a mistake made in a split second, a local child crossing too close to an invisible line, an impatient scuffle that Arthur had misinterpreted as a starting pistol. Before any of them really knew what was happening, every Shelby man was on the street, convinced that this was the moment they had been anticipating for days. And with the sudden surge of bodies, every gun was trained on another. Tommy had been ripped from sleep by Stella calling him to the window, and forced into action by Arthur’s shouting and swearing from below. He had pulled his clothes from the floor and torn the door open in his haste, leaving it to swing freely behind him. 

At first she hadn’t noticed, the light tapping of the doorknob against the wall a lost sound in the room behind her, as she watched the standoff on the street. But as she saw Tommy cut to the front of the men, she realised she had not heard the key in the lock behind him. She turned slowly, not quite daring to believe it. When she saw the corridor beyond, she froze. This was it. Either they’d all be killed, or they’d troop back in when the houses were washed with rival blood. But she finally had the choice to walk away from it when they were all too distracted to notice, on her terms, without the threat of Tommy going back on his word. 

She reached hesitantly for a dress, fingers fumbling with her underclothes as her vision flashed with images of Tommy lying in hospital beds. If he was to be hurt now, seconds from her, and she fled from him, would he survive? Would his face haunt her, dead or alive, as she tried to leave this place and these people behind? She slipped the dress over her head, and reached for her shoes. There was a little money in the purse in her suitcase, not much, but enough to buy a train ticket to far enough away it would be difficult to find her. She could change her name, prove her skills in another hospital, in another city. She could get lost in another world, now she had nothing left to lose. Besides Tommy, but was he even hers? Did she really want this life?

She threw whatever was closest into the suitcase, wrapped her coat around her. The shouting was reaching a fever pitch in the street outside, but she hadn’t the strength to look. His face flashed in her mind once more, but this time he was unhurt, his features tender and his grip on her soft and warm. She faltered at the top of the stairs, footsteps silenced on the wooden floor as she swayed slightly. But the tension was building under her skin, and she didn’t have time to think through any decision properly. Her body was telling her to run, to put a hundred miles between her and this situation. Her shoes beat against the wood, her hands clawing at the bannister for support as she made her way downstairs. 

Ada was blocking the backdoor, Polly beside her as they stood their ground against the hammering of more angry men. Polly had a pistol in her hand, her eyes hard and mouth tight. Stella lingered in the long hallway for a second, swaying once more as she realised there was only one door that would be left unguarded. Ada missed her, but Polly saw her retreating back towards the front of the house.

“Don’t be a fool!” Polly yelled, but Stella didn’t even hear her, too preoccupied with wondering how she could pass unnoticed when she got out of the house. It was be nearly impossible, but perhaps if she could run quickly enough through the crowded street, she would have a chance. There was no other option if she wanted to get away now. She tore her shoes off before she got to the threshold, bare feet pacing the last stretch of wooden floor as her legs caught the breeze blowing through the open front door. 

She was too much of a distraction to go unnoticed, of course she was. She had a moment of clarity when she caught her reflection in a window. Blonde hair whipping about her in the wind, bare legs below her dress, suitcase clutched to her chest as she tried to weave her way through the men. She heard him calling to her, heard the terror in his voice as he realised what was happening. She stumbled on the cobblestones at the sound, so coldly unfamiliar. 

And then she stumbled again, and this time her suitcase fell. But the sound was masked by a gunshot.


End file.
